Think Big Wins Rep. Emmer’s (MN-06) 2019 Congressional App Challenge

Rep. Tom Emmer has named two Hamburg students as the winner of the Congressional App Challenge in Minnesota’s 6th district. Central Public School’s Lacey Buckentin and Isabella Miller submitted Think Big, a study app for children grades 6-8  to help study for tests.

When asked why they were passionate about creating a studying app the students replied, “About 25-30% of children in grades 6-8 lose half of what they learned in the school year over the summer. We also noticed that some kids in our school and schools around us were failing classes and we wanted  to help them.” They hope to encourage other students to better their communities by using their computer science skills.  

Over 10,000 students registered for the 2019 Congressional App Challenge. These students created and submitted 2,177 functioning apps, marking the end of the most successful Congressional App Challenge to date. All told, 304 Members of Congress hosted Congressional App Challenges in their districts across 48 states, Puerto Rico, the Mariana Islands, and Washington, D.C.

The CAC is an initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives, where Members of Congress host contests in their districts for middle school and high school students, encouraging them to learn to code and inspiring them to pursue careers in computer science. The non-profit Internet Education Foundation provides the CAC with supplemental staffing and support. In the five years of the Congressional App Challenge, the program has yielded 1134 App Challenges across 48 states. Thousands of functional apps have been created by over 25,000 students, and participant demographics surpass all industry diversity metrics.